The private office feels smaller with Ford in it.

  She takes the chair across from the desk without asking, settles into it like she's done this a thousand times. Which she probably has. I close the door behind us - the lock clicks, loud in the quiet - and lean against the desk instead of sitting. Keeps me mobile. Keeps me from feeling like I'm the one being interviewed.

  Ford pulls out a small notebook and a pen. Old school. No phone, no tablet, no recording device I can see. I remember that from last time too.

  "Thank you for making time," she says. "I know today's been eventful."

  "You saw the Songbirds?"

  "I saw." She doesn't elaborate. "That's not why I'm here."

  "The confession, then. Elena Morales."

  Ford's expression doesn't change, but something in her posture shifts. A slight tension, a sharpening of attention. "You've seen the news coverage."

  "Hard to miss. Shapeshifter impersonated me and Councilwoman Richardson, working for Rogue Wave. Very dramatic."

  "You sound skeptical," she points out.

  I shrug. "I sound like someone who got impersonated for weeks and didn't notice until it was too late. Skeptical is generous."

  Ford writes something in her notebook. I can't see what. "Walk me through your understanding of the impersonation. When did you first become aware that someone was using your identity?"

  I try to avoid laughing. "Well, Argus Corps rolled up on me in public and tried to arrest me for a bunch of shit I didn't do. If you don't mind my French."

  "Not at all," she comments in the space between breaths.

  I take my helmet off, because it's getting sweaty and stuffy and I need to just rub my face a little bit. She raises an eyebrow but doesn't say anything about it, as I shrug out of my winter outerwear. Just bulletproof vests and underclothes now. "While I was out of costume, too. They came for the civvie side of things."

  "Mmhmm,"

  I push my hair out of my face. "Turns out someone had been running around as Bloodhound behind my back, and being deliberately sloppy, and getting caught on camera wearing my face. So they tried to snatch me while I was on my way home from school, and I almost made it home, but, you know. You probably heard that I was a fugitive for two weeks."

  "I hadn't," she comments, but I'm not sure if she's telling the truth or not.

  Sure, I'll bite. I lean back in the chair. She leans forward. "I was a fugitive for two weeks."

  "I heard."

  My cheeks sort of scrunch up as I try not to laugh. "So, my parents got a hold of Jerry Caldwell, we pointed out that I had a rock solid alibi, and then apparently whatever I was doing while I was on vacation was enough to make Alice - 'scuze me, Elena feel threatened. So she took my shape directly and tried to hold Maya hostage in public. So I found her and punched her lights out and then there was proof that there were two of me running around. So, probation for two weeks, and now we're here. Name's cleared."

  "Interesting," Ford says, writing it all down furiously without changing her expression once. "I was vaguely familiar with that. But I was wondering why a shapeshifter would try to steal the identity of a random teenage girl."

  "I assume at this point that all my enemies know who I am and don't shoot my parents out of, like, honor among thieves or whatever," I answer.

  Ford makes a face. I'm not sure what sort of face it's supposed to be, but it makes me feel kind of sad. No - she feels sad. She feels sad? I didn't know FBI agents were allowed to feel emotions. "That's not a sentence I think a 16 year old should ever have to say," she says, sounding sad. She sounds sad?

  "Sorry," I answer, not looking her in the eye, but she writes it down nonetheless.

  "...And you didn't report this to the NSRA?"

  "The NSRA and I aren't exactly on speaking terms."

  Ford's pen pauses. "The Chernobyl incident."

  "Among other things."

  She nods, writes something else. "So you conducted your own investigation."

  It's not a question. I don't confirm or deny.

  "The confession claims Elena Morales was employed by Rogue Wave," Ford continues. "Do you have any reason to believe that's accurate?"

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Here's the moment. The fork in the road. I can play along with the official narrative - yeah, sure, Rogue Wave, makes sense - or I can signal that I know it's bullshit without actually saying so.

  "Rogue Wave's not really in the impersonation business," I say slowly. "They're more about... product distribution. Jump, Fly, that whole ecosystem. Hiring a shapeshifter to frame a city councilwoman seems outside their wheelhouse. I've... met them before. They're, what's the word, my Mom taught me this one... mono... monomaniacal."

  "You've met them? Can you elaborate on who 'they' are?" she asks.

  "The main guys. There's like, one cell of six people, or I think seven now, and they just sort of give Jump away to anyone who asks and signs a contract," I answer.

  "Right, the mother cell. We're familiar." Ford studies me for a moment. Her eyes are dark and flat, giving nothing away. "So if not Rogue Wave, who would benefit from impersonating both you and Councilwoman Richardson?"

  I hold her gaze. "That's a good question."

  "Do you have an answer?"

  "I have theories."

  "I'd like to hear them."

  I push off from the desk, take a couple of steps toward the window. The blinds are half-closed, cutting the afternoon light into strips. Outside, I can see the parking lot, mostly empty now. A few staff cars. No Songbird vans.

  "Richardson's district has had a lot of problems lately," I say, not turning around. "Organized crime. Protection rackets. Unusual weather. And now a shapeshifter conspiracy that conveniently makes her look like a victim instead of... whatever else she might be."

  "Whatever else she might be," Ford repeats. "That's a careful phrase."

  "I'm a careful person."

  "Your file suggests otherwise."

  I turn back to face her. She's still sitting, still calm, pen hovering over her notebook. Waiting.

  "What do you want me to say, Agent Ford?" I ask. "That I think Richardson is dirty? That the shapeshifter was working for her, not against her? That the whole confession is a cover story designed to give her plausible deniability?"

  Ford doesn't react. "Is that what you think?"

  "I think a lot of things. Most of them aren't evidence."

  "Evidence is my job. Theories are useful too." She closes her notebook, tucks it into her jacket. "Bloodhound, I'm going to be direct with you. The Bureau has been tracking unusual activity in Northeast Philadelphia for several months. Organized crime patterns that don't fit the usual profiles. A freak blizzard over the new year. A sitting councilwoman who is, frankly, too clean."

  I blink. "How exactly is a person too clean?"

  "When people know they're being watched, they wipe their fingerprints from the gun. But all that shows is that they expect to get caught," Ford stands, smoothing her blazer. "The shapeshifter confession raises more questions than it answers. Elena Morales claims she was working for Rogue Wave, but her operational pattern doesn't match Rogue Wave's known methods. The impersonation of Richardson specifically - the timing, the targets, the level of access required - suggests someone with inside knowledge of her schedule and movements."

  "Someone like Richardson herself."

  "I didn't say that," she says, as she moves toward the door, then pauses with her hand on the knob. "The Bureau can't act on theories. We need evidence - documentation, witnesses, something that can survive a courtroom."

  "And you're telling me this because...?"

  "Because you're in a unique position." She turns to face me. "You said you've met Rogue Wave on the job. I don't doubt that. You can imagine how enthusiastic they'd be to talk to someone like me, versus someone like you."

  "Weird way to put it," I quip quietly.

  "All I'm asking, politely, is that if you find anything that leans one way or the other, the FBI would like to know about it, no questions asked. I don't want to subpoena you or compel you to talk. This isn't a coded threat. But something that doesn't smell kosher is happening in Philadelphia, and we'd like to have this handled sooner rather than later, before it goes from a bad smell to a catastrophe."

  "Is that a Jew joke?" I ask, raising an eyebrow back at her.

  "Yes," she answers flatly.

  I blink a couple of times. I process this. Ford is basically asking me to feed her evidence, off the books, no questions asked about how I got it. It's not exactly by the book, but then, neither am I.

  "Why should I trust you?" I ask. "Last time we met, you were taking notes while NSRA agents tried to pin Shrike's death on me."

  "I was observing. There's a difference." Ford's voice is flat, unapologetic. "The NSRA and the PPD both have their own agendas. The FBI operates on a different valence. I can't speak for the people above me, but this is my perspective as a security asset; If Richardson is dirty, I want to prove it. If she's not, I want to clear her. Either way, the uncertainty is a national security problem."

  "National security?"

  "A shapeshifter successfully impersonated a sitting elected official for an unknown period of time. If that can happen here, it can happen anywhere. The implications extend well beyond Philadelphia." She opens the door. "Think about what I've said. You have my card from last time - the number still works."

  She's halfway out the door when I speak. "Ford."

  She pauses.

  "The weather," I say. "The blizzards. You said meteorologists can't explain them."

  "I said they can't explain the one in early January. They could explain the later one. There was a low pressure system hanging over Philadelphia for two weeks. Sometimes, those cause blizzards," she elaborates. "But the first one, no. That was freak."

  "Right," I say. "Historically snowy season for Philly, I guess?"

  Ford's mouth twitches - not quite a smile, but close.

  "We'll be in touch," she says, and then she's gone, footsteps fading down the grand stair.

  I stand in the empty office for a long moment, staring at the closed door. Ford knows. Maybe not everything, but enough. She knows the confession is probably bullshit. She knows something is up with Maya. She knows something is very wrong in Northeast Philadelphia.

  I look at the Faraday cage door. At the key rack with its three little pieces of metal. At the window with its view of the parking lot where Ford is probably getting into an unmarked sedan right now.

  The pressure is building from every direction. Federal investigators. Nazi(?) protesters. A supervillain councilwoman.

  I look at my phone, half expecting another bomb. I stare at it. Nothing happens.

  I pocket the phone and head for the door. I feel off-balance, like something has shifted. Ford showing up changes the game. She's not an ally - not exactly - but she's a resource. A channel. A way to get evidence into the system without exposing how I got it. And the Music Hall - no, the Community Center - that's... useful. It's a central nexus. A place everyone wants a piece of.

  A part of me feels bad, thinking about it in such... what's the word, instrumental? Instrumental terms. But a part of me is already grabbing the sledgehammer. Time to knock down Mrs. Perfect Alibi.